


My Eyes Are Awake Before the Watches of the Night

by bbcsherlockian



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Dreaming, M/M, POV John Watson, Third Person Narrative, i like weird, unconventional narrative, yes it's weird
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-27
Updated: 2015-01-27
Packaged: 2018-03-09 08:47:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3243518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bbcsherlockian/pseuds/bbcsherlockian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A night and a morning and the moments in between.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Eyes Are Awake Before the Watches of the Night

He was on his right side with his fist curled alongside his face on the pillow, reminiscent of a child. His T-shirt clung to the contours of him and grew navy in the places where it had become damp. There was no light in the room. He was dreaming. 

He dreamt of sand, golden and running through the gaps between his fingers like water. The individual particles caught the light and danced in tandem with the sun and the dry sea churned around him for more miles than he could contemplate. It was so turbulent and so deadly. Where is the water? Everywhere. Nowhere. His mouth was dry. And when he looked about him he should have been squinting but he forgot to. The headache, sun-induced and pulsing so radiantly against his cranium; this he didn’t forget. The sand was everywhere, rising and twisting. He could barely swim. It was trapped beneath his fingernails and the grit blown into his eyes could have been asphalt and it was rattling its way into the dual hollow caverns of his lungs. The sky turned purple. Where are your fathers? Do they turn their backs on this? And then a yellow moon, clandestine and hypnagogic. This ocean appears red in the darkness. 

He dreamt of a face and a pair of eyes that he could not identify, but knew their owner nevertheless. Cold and not at all as real as genuine skin. The light caught the angles and was lost in the hollows and the eyes stared blankly on. He didn’t know where he was. Then a fire, surging and plummeting and licking the edges of his vision. They were inside a star that was burning up and consuming itself in the afternoon sky and no one noticed. What colour are the irises? The colour of the flames. There was a mouth and it was opening and closing and opening again and shouting an unknown language lost amongst the cacophony of the silence of the fire. He walked forwards but he had no feet. “You are a child,” he whispered but the eyes stared blankly on. “You are nothing more than a child.” There were too many more days for both of them but the searing heat had a pleasant aftertaste. There was something soft in the line of his chin. “What do your eyes look like?” he asked. “I know them.”

He dreamt of them and their glances in a place without daylight. They are looking and they have not turned their backs. They have turned away and we are independant, roaming this wilderness we are determined to sow into an Eden. They were never there at all. And still, he finds himself alone. 

He dreamt of pavements disappearing beneath him as he names the city for his own, of distant sirens crying out into this underbelly like newborns. There’s a hand next to his and he could take it if he wanted. Hot breath crystallising the night air, striking the back of his throat, the sharp noises of his naked feet against the concrete; you feel none of this in dreams. His eyes are more clear than ever and the wind has washed the sand away. Say nothing, watch as day breaks. Will you remember this? Will you remember the birds above the noise of the morning? Now running again, he wasn’t wearing anything, his boots were too heavy around his ankles. He used his body to tackle the figure to the ground and shout, “Caught!” as he sinks his teeth into the neck of the thing and his knees are grazed and it tastes like amrita and triumph and the sun rises over the buildings and he doesn’t notice the upwards flight of the starlings at all. 

He dreamt of hearing a voice that felt like lazy august afternoon on his naked skin. It washed over him and through him and beneath it was the sound of rapid gunfire. Monotonous and quiet and he became submerged in it. Residual desert sat at the back of his tongue and he let himself forget it was ever there at all as he slowly rose with the waking of the light. It adopted a soft tone led from a soft mouth which belonged to soft eyes and he could identify them now. Good morning, good morning. Can we lie here in this silence until we are the dust motes swallowing the muted eastern light filtered in between the curtains? And they go on, unnoticed as before. We have not turned our backs on the birds, they are intrinsic to the morning and invisible to anyone who hasn’t looked for them. The birds- The dishonest moon returns and he can’t swim. He didn’t see them, he didn’t see, he didn’t pay attention, the barren and arid landscape is pouring out of his throat and there is blood on his skin and it does not belong to him, take off your boots, you will not save this boy here. 

And then when he wasn’t dreaming anymore he reached out blindly in the darkness. Chest heaving, hands grasping. 

“I’m here,” the voice said. “I’m here.”

**Author's Note:**

> I stole my title from 'Psalm 119:148' and no, I'm not religious.


End file.
